Abandoned Farms

CNN PRODUCER NOTEmskents says she was taking photos of the bluebonnets, 'and the abandoned farm house seemed like an interesting contrast next to the fresh bluebonnets. I was wondering who use to live in the abandoned home.'
- dsashin, CNN iReport producer

This abandoned farm in Texas could symbolize the farm crisis in the 80's which happened all over the United States. Many had to leave their farms because the bank took them over.

It started with lower trade barriers together with Soviet purchases of American grain. It caused a sharp increase in agricultural exports where farm incomes soared. It sounds like a good thing but our government lowered Federal Land Bank restrictions for farmland purchases in the seventies leading to higher land values. Low interest rates persuaded many farmers to go into debt thinking land valued would keep rising.

But when there is a bubble it has to pop and the agricultural boom didn't last long. It hit the middle farmer the most because they didn't have the money of the large farm to pay off their debt. Farm debt had risen to 215 billion dollars. More than one third of the America's commercial farmers were in serious trouble. For the first time in history, the total of interest payments on farm loans exceeded total net farm income. Farm foreclosures rose.

The picture of the abandoned farm might be a warning to the United States to get out of debt and pay off their loans. Let's keep our country strong and buy goods which say made in the United States.

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